Ruhlman Family Time at Cleveland Race Week

Following Cleveland Race Week one-design weekend is additional days of women’s, youth, double-handed and "big boat" sailing. Topping out PHRF B was the Ruhlman family on their J/111 SPACEMAN SPIFF that won class honors with straight bullets in six races. For more Cleveland Race Week information, visit www.clevelandraceweek.com.

Royal Southern Yacht Club Harken June Regatta, 23-24 June

Sixty-one yachts competed in the Harken June Regatta, as part of the 2018 Summer Series organised by the Royal Southern Yacht Club. Glorious sunshine prevailed for a weekend of Solent racing with up to six races enjoyed by 11 classes. Nine J/111s were racing under their one-design Class Rules. Six teams made the race podium in a highly competitive series. Martin's Dent's Jelvis, the 2015 J/111 World Champion, was runner up and 2017 J/111 UK National Champion Tony Mack's McFly was third. Winner of the J/111 Class was Sebastien de Liedekerke Beaufort's Djinn, which had arrived in Hamble only a few days before the event. "The team come from Belgium and Holland, and we are very much a Corinthian team," commented Sebastien. "We have really enjoyed coming to Hamble and received such a warm welcome from the Royal Southern. The racing has been extremely well organised and very close. The J/111 Worlds are in Breskens this year so it has been very interesting to race here with British teams and other teams from Holland." Racing in the 2018 Royal Southern Summer Series continues with the July Regatta which will be over the weekend of 14/15th of July, sponsored by Charles Heidsieck champagne. For details on how to enter: www.royal-southern.co.uk.

Kashmir Earns Chicago NOOD Overall Title

Among the 11 Class winners at the Chicago NOOD on June 8-10 stood one above all: J/111 Kashmir, which earned the event’s overall title. The boat is co-owned by Steve Henderson, Mike Mayer and Karl Brummel. This was team Kashmir ’s first major regatta of the season in preparation for the J/111 North Americans later this summer, and the crew saw improvements in boat speed throughout the weekend as they settled in with new sails. "I thought we were fast downwind, and our speed upwind was OK on Friday, but not great," Brummel said. "We had some boathandling problems that we were able to fix." Kashmir’s results on Friday were a second and a third, but in Saturday’s first race, said Brummel, "We just got launched, and fortunately the other top three or four boats somehow got buried. We just kept getting faster and faster; our speed upwind was probably better than anybody’s at the end of the regatta. We were breaking in new jibs, so it was the first time trimming those and getting the rig right." The game plan going into the final race was to get a clean start and cover the competition, Brummel said. All they had to do was sail their boat well and sail better than everyone else. "But we failed to execute that plan," he said. "We got a horrific start. We were second row, we tacked out to port and went right. It turns out there was a nice lane of pressure on the right that wasn’t on the left, and we rounded the mark first." Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good, he added, but what also helped was that the second-place boat was over the starting line early and had to restart. "That took some pressure off of us, but the third-place boat got a good start so we were not thrilled with the first 30 seconds of the race," Brummel said. "We were flat out lucky." As the Helly Hansen Chicago NOOD’s overall winner, team Kashmir earns a berth in the Helly Hansen NOOD Caribbean Championship Regatta, presented by Sunsail in the British Virgin Islands this October. For complete results, visit https://yachtscoring.com/event_results_cumulative.cfm?eID=4474.

J/111 (top three - 12 Boats)

Kashmir, Karl Brummel/Steve Henderson/Mike Mayer - 3 -2 -1 -3 -1; 10

Shamrock, Jeffrey Davis - 4 -3 -3 -1 -5; 16

Rowdy, Richard Witzel - 2 -1 -9 -4 -2; 18

Wicked Time at 164th NYYC Annual Regatta, June 8-10

A winter of one-design racing in St. Petersburg and Annapolis hardened Doug Curtiss’ team on the J/111 Wicked 2.0. Matching up against a fleet of identical boats is a great way to learn precisely how to squeeze every drop of speed out of the 36-footer. "It tends to hone the skills a little bit," he says with a laugh. "We learned a lot." Still Curtiss came into the weekend, where he raced in the PHRF 2 class, with modest expectations. "We like to be top third and just go out there and have some fun," he says. "If I had to say there’s a signature that I hope to leave on the Wicked program, it’s that we have great crew chemistry, everybody has fun and we just like to be competitive." With a first in Saturday’s single race—a marathon that took teams all of four hours to complete—and a second Sunday, Curtiss exceeded all his goals. Wicked 2.0 won the class by a single point over Phil Lotz, commodore of the New York Yacht Club, who was racing the Club’s new IC37 in its inaugural Annual Regatta. For complete results, visit https://yachtscoring.com/event_results_cumulative.cfm?eID=4628.

J/111 BLUR Wins Skagen Offshore Race

Here is the report from Peter Gustafsson racing on his J/111 BLUR.SE.: "It is the first race of the season, and it can be anything from a hell of strong breeze of 14 m/s and frost at night to an amazing race with great sunsets and sunrises. This year we were definitely closer to the latter option. Above all, the pre-race dinner was fine. In 2015, we tried to make the dinner the night before the race to get together a coordinated training session where we can determine our watches and get into offshore mode. We have three watches, with two hours on, two hours standby and two hours in the bunk. With only five on board, I became my own watch. Not optimal, but we still want to sail this way. After a nice wind from Stora Pölsan to Færder lighthouse, the wind turned north and diminished. We were given a chance to look at our Code 1, which we bought used for Fastnet and has been unused since then. In the IRC, the half width must be at least 75%, so it becomes an ugly kinky shape compared to a ‘correct’ Code 0. In Åsgårdsstrand, we had lunch at the hotel, prepared the boat and slept for a few hours before it was time again to race. We got off well, like another boat at the left and could head east up the fjord. We had difficulty keeping up with the First 40 and X41, which is normal for us in these circumstances. It had been good wind for all previous starts before us. But, according to the forecasts, the wind started to decline when we started at 20:40. In the end, it all died! Ouch! There appeared to be consensus that the eastern side of the fjord was better. Both in the fjord and later during the race. Maybe we went south too early. But, we took off like a train when the wind came back in. A few that lay further west did OK, so we had some luck there. Flash Tango and Magic had gone better than us; many talented sailors who are still in the top. Here, I became a little negative and felt that we had missed the train. In 2010 + 2015, we had succeeded in taking early initiative and leading the class out of the fjord. Now, we were forced to hunt our competitors. After the Pisces turning mark, there was a big wind shift, and we were discussing different options. It would be one option to stay on layline and wait for the lift. Or, we could go east to get it first and maximize the effect. The routing software indicated going east would take 20 minutes longer. So, we stood by for about half an hour before the wind started to lift us. We looked inside for the boats we saw on AIS to the east of us; not moving so well. So, we battle south again. After a few minutes, Flash did the same thing. No real split, but we now had a better position than those that made us go some extra distance away. Phew. The new instruments worked well. Especially in light weather, they are different from Nexus, but it is probably the most common cause. Then it's a difficult time of year to fine-tune numbers. Big differences at different altitudes over the water, and lots of wind-shear. But, overall we are where we had hoped. Fun! One of the things that is difficult is to sail actively when it is dark and cold. We handle most things well, but for long periods, we are passive in both trim and steering. Due in part to the fact that we were only five crew, we need to find better routines to operate 100% under all conditions. Pretty dramatic going down the Weather Islands, where we met the boats that started from Stenungsund. Here it was also clear that the boats that came from the west, like Pixeline, had a hard time. We tested using the Code 1 just after Skålholmen, but realized quickly that we could not bear off to fly it and went back to the jib. We tested at least ... nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? It turned out that the early boats had good pressure all the way, and on the overall scores, you see that the boats that were over the finish line before 13:00 were best placed. It was only the really fast and the faster shorthanded boats that started at 19:20 that got in that early. We were over an hour behind them at sea and struggled with diminishing winds. But, at least we could chase the First 40 Flash, as we watched them constantly following on the AIS. From over 1 nm behind to 0.7nm to 0.4nm, we kept narrowing the gap with them. We tried to see which angles were most efficient for us, and where they might have been having difficulties. In the end, we passed them while they were trying hard to defend themselves by changing to another sail. Now, I looked a little closer on the scores, and we found that we would be finished in about 10 minutes. It was hard to get there, but we did what we could in the declining wind. Good change between A3, Code and then A3 again. And, finally, we were almost 15 minutes ahead of them on elapsed time, good for the corrected time overall win! A great win for us, and amazing teamwork!" For more Skagen Race information, visit http://www.blur.se/2018/05/12/helly-hansen-skagen-race-2018/.

Skeleton Key Controls COLORS Regatta

A mix of one-design Classes and handicap fleets embracing cruising boats, shorthanded sailors, and random leg racing was the format for the 2018 COLORS Regatta on June 2-3 in Chicago, IL with 107 teams on Lake Michigan. Seven J/111s competed in the Offshore Buoy Race Course 1 Racing One Design Division, getting off five races. Peter Wagner’s Skeleton Key dominated with four bullets and a second for 6 points and the victory. Richard Witzel’s Rowdy followed in second place with 10 points, and the Karl Brummel, Steve Henderson & Mike Mayer gang on Kashmir rounded out the top three with 17 points. Complete results may be found at https://yachtscoring.com/event_results_cumulative.cfm?eID=4699.